


ready, aim, fire (born to be glorious)

by triangularium



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Angst, Character Study, Communication, Depression, Fluff, Homophobia, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-17
Updated: 2017-06-17
Packaged: 2018-11-15 06:30:09
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,533
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11225250
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/triangularium/pseuds/triangularium
Summary: No matter how serious or trivial an event is, Hinata and Kageyama always manage to turn it into a competition.





	ready, aim, fire (born to be glorious)

**Author's Note:**

> Help! I have fallen into the rabbit hole that is Haikyuu!! and I can't get up! (but seriously, I am addicted to Oikawa as a character right now -- does that make me trash by association?)

**I. Hinata 44 : Kageyama 42**  
It’s seven in the morning when Hinata wakes up, and he sneaks deeper under the puddle of blankets and pillows that he had somehow arranged into a rough circle around him -- a crow’s nest of fabric -- during the night. He blinks lazily, ensconced in a cocoon of safety and coziness, until the world catches up with him.

_Oh, shoot! If I don’t run fast enough to the gym, Kageyama’s going to actually beat me this morning!_

He doesn’t know about Bakageyama, but he’s been keeping score -- it’s forty-four to forty-two right now in Hinata’s favor -- for... something. Maybe at some point he’ll bring it up as a form of blackmail so that he can get extra meat buns the next time the Karasuno team goes out for snacks together (not that Kageyama would allow himself to be blackmailed, he’d probably retort with a curt “Dumbass!” before the whole event would be forgotten).

He changes quickly (fifty seconds -- record time), grabs his lunch, and is out the door in two minutes, sprinting towards the high school campus. It’s early for a Saturday, so the streets are mostly empty, with only the occasional humming of running engines disturbing the thick suburban silence as cars speed past.

Hinata sees them in slow motion, tires squealing in sluggish revolutions, and breathes in the ice of the morning air blowing into his face and through his hair in an artificial wind created by speed. When he blinks the cold away, he can see the dewdrops and the glittering glow of spider webs hanging from grass, the image stuck to the inside of his eyelids even though he’s already left these sights half a block behind. 

Fast reflexes. It’s going to be a good day.

A black jacket in the distance, thin, and much taller than he could ever hope to be. It could be any one of them, even Suga, Daichi, or Asahi -- who would let him win if they raced -- but the unique stiffness of the figure’s gait tells him that this is the person he’s been looking for. Hinata smirks and pumps his legs faster.

“Kagey-y-yama-a-a!” he shouts unnecessarily as he passes him, a complacent pride infusing his limbs with the lassitude of expected victory.

“What?!” Kageyama spits, sputtering in surprise and temporarily left behind in the rising dust before he catches on. However, in a few steps, he’s nipping at Hinata’s heels, and Hinata can feel the warmth of his breath, making the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. There’s an uncomfortable but not entirely unwelcome sensation rising somewhere in the vicinity of his stomach -- a nervousness, but one that’s totally different from puking right before a match. His heart jumps a bit, like he’s falling down a steep steel drop of a roller coaster, and he slows down involuntarily, dizzy and high with the all-encompassing, indescribable _something_.

Unfortunately, this is all that Kageyama needs to catch up with him.

Hinata traces his profile from the corners of his eyes, tentative and daring. Blue eyes darkened and narrowed by focus, nostrils flaring, mouth hanging open in mid-gasp. There’s a bit of drool seeping from the corner of his mouth, invisible to everyone not traveling at their shared speed.

They don’t do things by halves. Like volleyball and the few other pursuits they choose to devote themselves to, these races are approached with ultimate seriousness. Suga has often joked that if they’d been consumed by the prospect of class rank, they’d both end up vying for the position of top student in the grade.

Suddenly, Kageyama turns to him and smirks, hair flopping lazily over his eyelids. Then, he runs even faster and Hinata can’t stay in step, coughing and surprised as his best friend rushes ahead and slaps the gym door before sinking down onto the steps, exhausted.

When did he build the stamina to compete with -- no, outclass -- Hinata?

Hinata wonders at this new development and crumples next to him in an ungainly heap of crossed limbs, watching small beads of sweat form on Kageyama’s forehead and slide down his throat.

Dewdrops.

“Forty-three.”

Hinata startles, hazel eyes blinking out of his self-induced trance. 

“What?”

“My score’s forty-three now, baka,” Kageyama grumbles, but he’s all bark and no bite.

“How did you--”

“You’re unnecessarily competitive.” Hinata thinks this is a little hypocritical but he’s not going to call Kageyama out when he’s so tired. He flops back onto the concrete and listens to the thud-thud of his heartbeat. “Of course you were keeping count.”

He grins, his lips quirking up in that innocent way that Kageyama has long since learned to recognize as bad news. Then, he leaps up, ignoring the satisfying burn in his muscles, the way he struggles to inhale as though all the air in the world will never be enough.

“One more!”

**II. Hinata 125 : Kageyama 128**

Lev’s whip spike has been visually arresting since they first encountered it, but after days of being unable to come up with a suitable counterattack, most of Karasuno finds it more annoying than admirable.

The score currently stands at 18 : 24, with Nekoma at match point.

“Ready!” Noya shouts, crouching down in standard receiving position, and the rest of the team echoes the sentiment, albeit wearily. Morale is low, especially considering the fact that the crows have only won 2 out of the 20 practice games they’ve played so far. It’s not really a favorable ratio, as Tsukishima takes vicious pleasure in pointing out whenever Hinata goes starry-eyed with dreams of the Small Giant and nationals.

Kenma serves, sending the ball over the net in a gentle arc that Noya slides to shoot up into the air again. It grows smaller, receding, and then returns with a vengeance, coming short to the net.

Noya apologizes and yells a warning to Kageyama, who seems to be in a world of his own, cut away from the outside except the bare essentials of the tips of his fingers and the volleyball -- a colorful meteorite hurtling towards the earth.

Hinata digs his heels into the ground and races in a zigzag pattern meant to throw off blockers, aiming for the end of the net. For a moment, he’s thankful for his bright, distinctive hair which helps him stand out and do his job as the decoy.

The final distraction, the red herring of the group.

As he falls out of his jump, imagining the satisfying smack of rubber against his palm, Asahi soars behind him, radiant with power, arms momentarily poised in perfect technique. The two blockers jump, rising, but it doesn’t seem like they’ll make it on time.

Then, several things occur in quick succession, and if Hinata had blinked, he may have missed all but the disappointing result as the ball is smashed to the ground on Karasuno’s side.

Somehow, Lev has sprinted across the court, accurately judged the predicted path of the ball after it was spiked, and won the brief mid-air battle against its trajectory, all in the course of a few seconds. Asahi’s shocked, shattered expression is the remnant of a hope dangled cruelly before him, the promise of the other side and the blissful feeling of flight beyond the net divider broken by pinioned wings.

The whistle blows.

18 : 25.

Another lap of diving drills.

This is the last game of the day, and everyone slumps into the penalty halfheartedly, sick with bitter dismay of loss after loss after loss. 

They’re unreliable narrators. To the outsider, as Ukai observes, they’re shifting and unpredictable, in a constant state of flux, and Nekoma is only able to beat them because they haven’t yet settled into their roles. He touches his thumb to his lips. The position of middle blocker will soon belong to either Tsukishima or Hinata, not both, and it’s quite clear who is desperate to leave that spot to become ace.

Growing pains.

To escape the egg is always a struggle, but the exhaustion from pushing physical limitations is temporary and far better than stasis.

Hinata throws himself into the mock receives with the same vigor he tackles practice games with, and nudges Kageyama as he gets up, not bothering to brush off his dusty kneepads.

“First one to finish the lap wins!” he chirps, and immediately sinks into his second, leaving Kageyama to parse the statement and yell abuse before following.

Gradually, Tanaka, Suga, and Daichi relax, the acquired tension and stress disintegrating into friendly ribbing. Even Asahi appears more at ease, although Ukai can tell he’s still blaming himself for the failure.

“O-o-hhh!” rises abruptly. Hinata is dancing around, apparently incapable of saying anything else. He’s reached the water bottles moments before Kageyama, who’s attempting unsuccessfully to justify his loss while Tsukishima and Yamaguchi snicker at the duo’s antics in the corner.

“One-twenty-six!” he screeches triumphantly. Kageyama merely scowls.

All is well.

**III. Hinata 154: Kageyama 150**

It takes Hinata a little longer to accept that the gooey, mushy feeling that sends all the air out of his lungs when he sees Kageyama with bedhead (oh, who is he kidding? the “with bedhead” portion of the phrase is optional) goes beyond the fuzzy boundaries of friendship and into something completely different -- dangerous, uncharted territory.

They’ve remained slightly longer than the others to train a new quick and lock up, and Hinata knows now that this is the worst decision of his life, including that one time Noya dared him to drink directly from a dirt-encrusted bottle of sake found in the back rooms. He’d ended up getting a hangover that prevented him from going to school -- let alone practice -- the next day.

_Yes, this is worse, he thinks sluggishly. This is the way I die. Shouyou.exe has crashed, error report unsent._

Kageyama twists slightly to look at him, and Hinata quickly wipes the dazed expression off his face, but he probably hasn’t been entirely successful because Bakageyama glances at him with no little concern before asking, “Pass me the shampoo?”

Hinata swallows and hands it over.

_Keep your eyes above the waist, keep your eyes above the waist_ , he coaches himself, and wishes he could bleach his brain to destroy the image of slick, rippling trapezius muscles, damp, blue-black strands, and beautiful navy eyes that’s been imprinted into it. _No, not navy. Royal blue, fit for the king of the--_

“Are you done? I want to dry my hair.”

He doesn’t look away fast enough this time, and the view is better than he could have imagined. Abashed, he licks his lips unconsciously and doesn’t answer. He doesn’t trust that his voice won’t be hoarse or otherwise loaded with the heart he wears on his sleeve, giving himself away.

“What’s wrong with you?”

_Nothing. Everything._ Hinata’s eyes flicker downward. Footsteps approach, little splashes washing up against his half-submerged feet. Kageyama’s voice is unusually loud in the silence of the changing room.

“You’ve been acting weird today... missing my tosses, forgetting to shower, staring--”

That’s all it takes for Hinata to leap into motion.

“Gomen, gomen!” he yelps, self-conscious and afraid that Kageyama will blast past his paltry defenses and somehow stumble upon the truth in his unique, emotionally tone-deaf way. “I need to leave now and pick up some Pocky for Natsu--”

“Without your clothes?” Kageyama interrupts smoothly, his bangs curling and matted against his head. One side of his mouth is twitching up, as though he’s trying not to laugh. This would have irritated first-year Hinata into an argument, but it turns second-year Hinata into an internally squealing, sappy mess. He shakes his head. He once had a crush on Yachi -- he can’t like _boys_.

He’s spaced out again, and Kageyama’s uncharacteristically gentle touch, tilting his chin upwards and bending down to meet his lips grounds him. He gasps, stunned.

It’s nothing like the movies or those penny novels his mom likes to read. There’s no electricity, no charge crackling between them, zapping like power lines in a storm. It’s lazy weekend afternoons and sunshine, dust hanging in the air -- a different kind of tension like slicing melting butter, the slow heat ( _warm, safe, home_ ) of water that slides into a boil. A different sort of passion that’s no less fulfilling.

It’s normal for Kageyama to find love letters in his locker nowadays. He’s mysterious and cold and distant (at least, that’s what the girls -- and some boys -- believe) and those traits are universally appealing in their specialness, complimented by Kageyama’s genius volleyball abilities.

Is this a one-time thing? Doubts threaten the fate of the small bubble of happiness growing somewhere deep inside. He doesn’t think he could tolerate being just friends-with-benefits, that in-between, ill-negotiated no-man’s-land that only leads to unrealistic expectations and ruined relationships. But Kageyama is brilliant and glowing and he could have anyone, so why would he pick Shouyou?

Kageyama’s backed off. He looks constipated, and Hinata’s about to point that out before he realizes that it’s nervousness. Anxiety is a foreign contortion of Kageyama’s facial muscles, but he shifts back and forth, wringing his hands.

“IthinkIhaveacrushonyou,” he mumbles under his breath, and Hinata’s forehead wrinkles, confused. Kageyama notices it (he’s always been an open book) and sighs, before repeating, slower. To anyone who doesn’t know him, he seems in control, but Hinata, with a practiced sizing up, can tell he’s on the edge of bolting or denying that this event even occurred. He shakes himself out of his reverie and blurts out the words he’s wanted to say since a year ago (longer, but he hadn’t realized it).

“Kageyama, I like-like you, too!”

Kageyama exhales, relieved. He hadn’t known he’d been holding his breath the whole time.

“Tobio,” he says. “Not Kageyama.”

“Tobio,” Hinata tests the name on his tongue, odd but familiar and right. “Then, I’m Shouyou!”

Tobio smiles, and the sight transforms Hinata’s insides into liquid. Obviously, he has to take steps to rectify this and regain his lost manliness.

“Oi, then does that mean I’m the king now? What does that make you -- the queen?”

“One-fifty-one!” Tobio snarls and makes grabby hands for a known weakness -- Shouyou’s ticklish sides -- but the latter nimbly darts away, and the bickering begins anew.

Shouyou had a crush on Hitoka Yachi for two months. She was cute and kind and distinctly feminine, arguably the polar opposite of Tobio. Shouyou touches his lips.

He kissed Yachi once, when he leaned across the study table and planted his mouth on hers in a messy, awkward collision of noses. It was supposed to be a practice kiss, but there had been an unspoken consensus that they wouldn’t try a similar incident in the future. It felt like the kisses he dropped on Natsu’s head after she’d smeared fingerpaint across his cheeks, endearing and loving in a way restricted for the magical connection between siblings.

Tobio is not Yachi.

Tobio is not a girl.

He _likes_ Tobio. The realization has been a long time in coming, and it doesn’t scare him as much as he thought it would.

Maybe it’s not such a bad thing to like boys after all.

**IV. Shouyou 567 : Tobio 569**

The letter is utterly ordinary and innocuous.

Shouyou almost tosses it into the garbage can at first, dismissing it as another targeted ad, but something ominous hangs in the air and he stares at it like it’s going to explode before he opens and reads it.

There’s an overwhelming joy that permeates his being and his heart goes _gwah_ and _bwah_ and Tobio will be so proud -- oh, no. 

Tobio.

One of Tobio’s longtime dreams has been to play for the national volleyball team. He even once attended the Youth National Volleyball Camp and is presently considered by everyone in their collegiate club to be a shoo-in for its selective recruitment process. And now he’d hear that his boyfriend had been accepted before he had... for a moment, Shouyou seriously considers hiding the paper and pretending to forget about it until the future becomes too imminent for him to ignore. It works with his failed tests, so the principle can be extended to volleyball correspondence as well, he reasons.

_No_ , he reassures himself. _Tobio will be happy for me, because he loves me and he’s been helping me train for years and I deserve to compete at the national level_.

He smiles shakily.

He’s come a long way from the sunny, overly optimistic personality he’d adopted in high school with the hopes of goofing off to obtain friends and earn people’s trust. He’s stared into the abyss of harsh reality when his parents threw his few belongings onto the street curb after he came out to them, when he’d sunk into a depressive funk that had frightened Tobio with its intensity, when he’d been told that under no circumstances would he be allowed to see Natsu, for fear of his ‘gayness’ spreading and infecting her as well. As if being gay is a transmissible disease, implying that it can be ‘cured.’

What does it mean to be normal? 

He knows he’s comparatively lucky. Nobody from Karasuno has cut off all contact, although his former team members had acted somewhat strangely at first when he’d declared that he and Tobio were officially dating. Interestingly, Tsukishima and Yamaguchi had been the first to offer their unwavering support, although this was tempered, on Tsukishima’s part, by several veiled prods at Tobio’s nickname morphing into queen (or rather -- queer) of the court.

“I’m home, Shouyou!” Tobio calls as the door creaks open, toeing off his shoes at the entrance. “Tonkatsu ramen --,” Shouyou holds his breath silently (he still seeks Tobio’s approval for the simplest things and this isn’t really healthy but it’ll take him time to heal), “-- smells amazing!”

He walks into the living room of their shared apartment, fresh from an important presentation he’s been delivering in his economics class. Shouyou tells him frequently that if a volleyball career doesn’t work out, Tobio can make a living in sales or business -- he has a tendency to get straight A’s here even though it’s only tangentially related to his major in Physics, a subject he actually dislikes. 

He can smell Tobio’s cologne and the musty tang of sweat from this distance, but he shivers as he surveys the sleek cut of the pearl grey suit, the way it broadens Tobio’s shoulders, narrows around his hips. He looks powerful and regal and Shouyou is definitely blushing because Tobio knows about this _inclination_ of his and doesn’t hesitate to take advantage of it at inopportune times.

Such as this one.

Tobio looks smug as he closes in, but Shouyou interjects before they get caught up in the moment and lost in one another, “I got invited to join the national team.”

It’s bald and blunt and so completely Shouyou that they both freeze instantly. Shouyou winces. 

_I could have worded that more diplomatically -- I’m so self-centered and worthless, worthless, worthless..._

Arms envelop him, caressing and careful. He dives past the previous scents to reach something totally Tobio -- spicy, dark, and warm, like hot chocolate in the park as ice flutters to the ground in strange, symmetric, never-repeating shapes.

No two snowflakes are ever the same.

“I’m so proud of you,” Tobio murmurs into his hair, and Shouyou smiles sadly against his neck. This is the side of Tobio that he won’t see in public, the side that is reserved for his invisible lover and a family that had been more accepting of his sexual orientation than Shouyou’s had been of his. They wear masks in front of their college friends ( _We’re just roommates, you know -- nothing more!_ ) because it’s dangerous to be so openly gay in a community that doesn’t fully accept the existence of this suppressed underground, preferring to hide behind the thin veneer of the nuclear family instead.

“Say yes, dumbass,” Tobio continues, flicking Shouyou’s forehead playfully, and walks into the kitchen to set the table. “If you think I’m not going to practice twice as hard to get onto the team, too, you’ve got another thing coming. We’ll work on improving our receives tomorrow.”

Shouyou laughs, amused, before following him.

“Wasn’t thinking that for a second, Bakageyama!” _I’m at 568_ , he notes mentally. _Catching up_. “But are you sure your old-man knees can keep going?”

“Of course they can! What? ‘Old-man knees’?!”

“Kidding, kidding! How was your day?”

**V. Hinata 1233 : Kageyama 1232**

Tobio buys the ring on a whim. He’s walking past a Tiffany’s on his twilight run. He likes to keep in shape during the weekends even though he’s exercising almost all day on weekdays -- maintaining his spot on the national team is surprisingly hard due to encroaching talent creep. He guesses he finally understands how Oikawa felt when he was forced to practice longer and harder to keep up with a volleyball dork gifted with a little more natural talent.

Then, he sees it.

It’s like a revelation, a lightshow, and a _blam!_ (as Shouyou would exclaim) all at once. Before he knows it, he’s pushing open the glass door, the tiny gold bell attached to it is jingling, and a blast of cool air buffets his sweaty body. Immediately, he feels out of place.

It’s not that he can’t afford what he’s looking for but rather that this store is too clean, too sterile, too impersonal for him. Everything is quiet and glittering and soft and delicate. He feels as though he’s a bull in a china shop; he can’t touch or even breathe too hard or everything will break.

The attendant bustles in, light, bony, and encased in taffeta -- faelike in her grace. She looks like she hasn’t so much as made a home for herself amongst the metal and stones but rather been gradually chipped, molded, and polished until she was as distant and far-removed from humanity as the amethysts positioned in the wall recesses.

This makes Kageyama uncomfortable, and he resolves to escape as quickly as possible after he has accomplished his goal.

“The ring in the display outside,” he clears his throat, not sure if she can hear him, “how much is it?”

“Oh, that’s the only one of its kind that was shipped to this distribution center, so it is very pricey,” she hesitates, looking him up and down and evidently deciding that he couldn’t afford it anyway and didn’t require an in-depth explanation.

“How expensive?” Kageyama bites out impatiently. He can’t deviate from his path for too long, or Hinata will fret or -- worse -- can suspect something is afoot. They haven’t talked about engagement yet, but certainly he must be expecting it as an inevitability at some point? Kageyama is sure that he wouldn’t want to spend the rest of his life with anyone else, wondering about a shapeless, unknown figure kissing Hinata at an altar (they wouldn’t know that the roof of his mouth was sensitive or that he liked to take control when they were making out the way Kageyama does).

“Nine hundred thousand yen.” The clerk’s lips are a dubious, tilted slash of thin red gloss across her face. He puzzles absently over how much her lipstick must have cost for a moment before brushing the thought away and negotiating over payment in installments. He’d rather not make a huge, noticeable dent in his bank account in a blatant move that even the perpetually oblivious Hinata would find alarming.

As he proceeds to checkout, the store employee brightens up, likely at the prospect of shepherding in money through commissions. She’s unexpectedly chatty, reminiscing about her nephew’s recent marriage to a “very sweet girl who is studying to be a doctor.” Kageyama listens with one ear and checks his watch from time to time, fidgety with the need to be outside and running, where he belongs.

She hands the wrapped bag containing the purple cushioned box over to him with a genuine smile. _Perhaps that’s why she works here -- to glimpse the excitement and activity that accompanies engagements and symbolically cementing the permanence of a relationship_. His icy heart melts ever-so-slightly.

“Your girlfriend is lucky to have you!”

It’s a throwaway remark, but it sends him shooting down from the heavens.

He still forgets sometimes.

He can’t legally marry Shouyou, not while they’re in Japan.

He walks back onto the road, into the warm summer evening that tastes like honeydew melons and street vendor ramen and red velvet cake at midnight, but he has never felt colder. The eighteen-karat gold and inset diamonds burn a hole through his pocket, dragging him down, and he’s already panting though he’s five blocks away from home.

Somewhere, in a parallel universe, Shouyou isn’t gazing out the window, past the fire escape and the balcony, dreaming of when his secret, not-so-secret boyfriend will walk through their double doors. She’s studying for her finals, puttering about the kitchen, or playing video games (badly, because in no universe will Shouyou ever be good at Rainbow Road). He’ll surreptitiously sneak over the welcome mat and kneel in front of her, asking the age-old question and listen to her shriek “Yes!”

Yes, I’ll hold your hand even when times are hard and we’ll face the future and its uncertainties together.

Yes, I’ll be able to hug you and engage in frankly disgusting PDA (according to Tsukishima, at least) with you without worrying about catcalls or insults or the looming threat of hate crimes.

Yes, I’ll spend the rest of my forever with you.

Or maybe Tobio’s the girl. He’s not picky.

They’re each other’s firsts and lasts. It would be incredibly romantic in any other situation. Tobio had never given the time of day to another person before Shouyou, so sometimes he thinks he’s not homosexual or heterosexual at all. He used to believe he was asexual, but now he’s convinced he’s Hinata-sexual.

It doesn’t matter what body Shouyou inhabits, what gender he chooses to adhere to. If souls exist (for people like them), Shouyou’s would be the most beautiful to him.

One-thousand-two-hundred-thirty-three.

A tie.

_The ball’s on your side of the court, Shouyou._

**VI. Hinata 9869 : Kageyama 9873**

After dodging the subject of dinner for hours, Shouyou finally confesses that the last excursion he’d planned was a reservation for two at the Joel Robuchon.

“French food!” He looks up at Tobio and the edge of the couch from where he’s sitting between his legs, chin on one thigh. His eyes are brown, brown, brown and so trusting as he tilts his head, deceptively guileless (considering what they’ve just done, there’s no reason for him to look this way).

Tobio hasn’t told him that he can’t resist when he’s faced with the puppy-dog expression but he rests his mind knowing instinctively that Shouyou can’t say no to him either when he puts his mind to teasing manipulation and subterfuge.

“Why not?” he agrees lazily, slumping against the cushions and peeking half-lidded at his husband in all but name. “Gimme ten minutes, Sho-chan...”

His slurring is a warning sign, and it’s not one that escapes Shouyou.

“Oh, no, you’re not falling asleep on me,” he tugs Tobio awake, the hair at the back of his head sticking up awkwardly from where it’s been pressed against a decorative pillow. Tobio blinks slowly, ruffled, vaguely irked, and looking like a dragon that has been unwillingly roused from the prospect of centuries of peaceful slumber. “I bought you a new suit, too; you have to try it on!”

Tobio merely grumbles and Shouyou chuckles at his cranky appearance, but somehow, they make it outside fully dressed and on schedule.

“You’ll love it there,” he says confidently and babbles more to fill up the silence with the mindless chatter of words. Tobio’s more tired than usual today; having to go to work on their anniversary hasn’t been conducive to his mood, but he needs to make up this reticence to Shouyou somehow.

He grabs his hand, twining their fingers together. They interlock perfectly.

Shouyou promptly shuts up and this is so uncharacteristic of him that Tobio turns and stares in alarm.

“We don’t normally do this where other people can see,” Shouyou explains, swinging their linked hands while he’s struggling to keep a smile disturbing in its wideness off his face. “I like it! It makes my stomach all tingly.”

Then, he runs into a wall (it’s not a wall, but a chest built like bricks).

“Oh, look what we have here!” one of the drunk men sways, swinging a glass bottle like it’s a weapon. Tobio glares at them and follows the path of the container warily before Shouyou roughly shoves him behind his smaller body, angry and defiant. The contrast in their sizes is almost comical, but Shouyou does have a history of landing himself in circumstances in which he pisses off someone much larger than he is. “A couple of stupid _faggots_.”

Tobio places a restraining hand on Shouyou’s shoulder. These people aren’t sober, although this isn’t a good excuse for what they’ve said.

The scariest part of the scene isn’t the way other pedestrians simply flow around them, distracted bystanders to injustice, but rather the mundaneness of the group -- disheveled in their suits and ties, salarymen who could just as well be Tobio or Shouyou’s coworkers. He feels suddenly sick.

They don’t have tattoos or piercings or stereotypical marks of the dregs of society.

Could that have been him if he’d grown up differently? If he hadn’t met Shouyou?

One takes Shouyou’s glowering bravado as a personal offense.

“Wanna fight, shrimp?”

The next few minutes are a blur of movement as Shouyou tears his way out of Tobio’s unforgiving grip to smash a fist into the man’s jaw. He stumbles backward and nearly falls before recovering himself but Shouyou’s fast. He aims for the solar plexus and his opponent doubles over in agony.

Across the street, an off-duty policeman parallel parks his marked car next to a bank.

“Let’s go,” someone sane and self-preserving mentions nervously, and miraculously, the others listen to him. “No use trying to stop these gays.”

_Herein lies the fundamental problem_ , Tobio thinks. _As long as people believe that romantic and sexual relationships should only exist between a man and a woman, they’ll be misguided into having the opinion that discouraging anyone who doesn’t fit into the mold -- violently or not -- is for their own benefit_. 

The worst kind of indoctrination is one rooted in the principle of public service and presumed personal sacrifice.

Shouyou’s nose is bleeding and breaths rip out of him in ragged gasps. His lips tremble as though he’s going to start crying, but he seems to fortify himself and stand up taller before he faces Tobio. His shirt collar has blood on it. 

_It looks like they’ll be skipping the reservation today_ , Tobio notes blankly.

“I’m so sorry, Tobio,” he chokes out. “I just ruined our night out -- I’m so sorry--”

Tobio simultaneously wants to shake him and give him everything happy in the world. They don’t belong here, in the darkness of a seedy Tokyo alley. Shouyou deserves open fields and wildflowers and puppies that scamper lightly, mischievously around his feet -- the bright rays of the sun.

Nine-thousand-eight-hundred-seventy.

“You were totally my damsel in distress, Tobio!” Shouyou sniggers a while later, when their memories have faded, though not disappeared completely.

They never disappear, only scar over in thin, almost unnoticeable lines they pretend not to see in each other.

_I love you, Hinata Shouyou. How can this be any less than that couple on the bench we just passed, the thousands of divorces that are filed every day, the abusive marriages that exist but are legitimate in the eyes of the majority?_

**VII. Hinata 50892 : Kageyama 50891**

The hospital nurse raises her eyebrows when she sees him for the third time in as many days.

“For a friend, you sure visit him very often,” she comments. “Don’t you have anything better to do?”

“I’m his best friend.”

The word “friend” is bitter in his mouth, like Tobio’s odd cough medicine concoction sliding down his throat when he’s laid up in bed with the flu. It’s supposed to taste like cherries and there is a slight flavoring that justifies this categorization, but far more overpowering is the thick, syrupy goop of what Shouyou assumes is the effective remedy.

Tobio is thin and frail under the covers, washed out and shriveled in a way he never was when he could move, speak, dream. Shouyou’s companion whisks herself away in a flurry of baby blue scrubs and the sharp odor of antiseptic, giving him the precious gift of privacy in the form of time alone with the most important person in his life.

He sits cautiously down on the padded chair angled next to Tobio’s head. Beyond the opened window that allows liquid gold-orange to splash across the floor in rivulets, bleeding between the cracks of the swinging blinds, he can hear the laughter of children drawing with chalk on the sidewalk. Crickets chirp, a constant buzz of sound. 

Awake.

He traces the veins that stand out angrily on Tobio’s pale skin as though his personality is trapped inside an unmoving body, desperate to claw its way out. 

This is a misconception, he knows. Kageyama Tobio is the legal definition of brain dead.

“I love you,” he says and the words sound unwieldy in his mouth after years of easy “Love ya!” and later “Lovou.” However, they are no less honest or raw.

What is different now is the lack of response, but it doesn’t faze Shouyou. He lies down, half on his chair and half on Tobio’s pillow.

_Shove me off_ , he prays, _like you always do. And then I’ll wake up in the middle of the night to find myself squished between the limbs you drape all over my body. I didn’t expect you to be a clingy sleeper_. He waits for an interminable period as the light turns an inky blue-purple, still (he wants to turn himself into a corpse, and he knows this isn’t the way you do it).

Elsewhere, in the place that Tobio has managed to reach before him, there is a volleyball court. 

It is empty and he is alone as the filmy fog before his eyes rises and vanishes. He picks up one of the balls on the ground. It is old, worn, and forlorn, and he loves it first.

There are important things he doesn’t remember. Won’t remember (yet), with the memories sliding through his fingers like water from a bathroom sink. Like rain.

A flash of orange-red hair, the touch of a curve of a smile. Shaving foam on the mirror, sand rough and sticky between his toes, ice cream on a yacht at sunset.

He shakes it away and leaps into a tightly-controlled jump serve he hasn’t been able to do in years. He can’t practice tosses without --

A ball arcing smoothly from his fingers to a silhuoette so bright and fuzzy that it nearly blinds him in its brilliance.

_Is this God?_

He wonders at the shape of this world (and the one he has left behind).

Far away but closer than he thinks, Shouyou blinks.

Fifty-thousand-eight-ninety-two.

The upper hand has oscillated between the members of the weird duo for years, but they’ve finally broken even again.

As he stares at the steady, regular lub-dub that creates curves and sharp lines on the ECG monitor, he can’t help but wish that this was one race that Tobio hadn’t won.

“Visiting hours are over.”

He takes a deep breath of the room that tastes saccharine like fake flowers and death. Tobio would have hated it -- lying there wasting away, incapable of performing the most basic life processes. 

_Is love selfish?_ he asks himself, and the words bounce around, reverberating across the walls of his mind. _Am I selfish? For wanting to preserve this, even though it’ll never be enough?_

He digs his nails into his arms until he bleeds and leaves half-moon impressions of pain behind.

Then, he lets go.

**VII. To You, From Fifty Years Ago**

Hey ~~Hinata~~ ~~Shouyou~~ ~~me~~! (I’m not going to address myself specifically here because it feels weird)

I’m me -- well, you. You don’t need to know how old I am, but I’m older than you. And way more mature and responsible, if you can believe it!

I’m writing this for the Shouyou who’s just been eliminated from the junior high volleyball prefectural qualifiers, the Shouyou who’s the only guy at his school who likes volleyball so much he’d practice with the women’s team, the Shouyou who right now thinks he’ll never find anyone quite like him.

In a couple of months, you’re going to register to attend Karasuno in the fall, elated by the idea of going to the same school as your idol -- a former powerhouse. Emphasis on the _former_.

You’re not going to find Coach Ukai -- at least not the one you expected. But you are going to become a part of the funniest, most supportive, talented and amazing group of volleyball players you will ever meet. And you’ll work well together.

You know that guy you met -- the crazy setter from Kitagawa Daiichi? The one who asked you what you’d been doing for the past few years? The one who became your self-proclaimed rival after your match?

He’s going to be there, too. Nothing starts out all right at first, but eventually ~~you won’t be able to live without him~~ you’ll learn to live with each other. He’ll mellow out more with you balancing him and he’ll be the anchor for your impatience -- the realism to your dreamy impracticality.

It sounds like a fairy tale. Things are going to get better, and then they’re going to get worse. 

You’ll get hurt. You’ll cry -- a lot. Some days, you’ll wonder why you’re alive, and if you deserve what’s happening to you. Some days, you’ll feel empty and unfulfilled, like the years are slipping away from you and you have to keep running, even after your legs hurt so much they’re going to fall off, continue one more lap of diving drills.

It’s the other days that make life worth it. When you wake up next to the person you love, when your friends accept your quirks unconditionally and prove that they’re _real_ friends, when you make your special someone laugh for the silliest reason.

You’re going to do so many things, meet so many people, break so many records. So don’t forget that you have infinite potential. Hold that thought close to your heart every day you want to run away from who you are.

I’m getting sentimental in my old age. Can you believe how well I can write in English now?

When you’re done reading this (don’t ask Yachi to translate by the way), I want you to go give Natsu a hug. I know you’ve been arguing about who ate the last peanut butter Oreo, and it’s not her.

You have a long, bumpy ride ahead of you, courtesy of me. Get ready and hold on tight!

Welcome to the real world.

Good luck!

_Hinata Shouyou_

**Author's Note:**

> They’re so revoltingly _adorable_ with each other. Disclaimer: I don’t know what it’s like to be LGBTQ+ in Japan. Although I’ve done some research in the form of online articles / blog posts, there are probably some discrepancies as I’ve tried my best to imagine and extend from stories I’ve heard in the U.S.
> 
> “Love is love is love is love is love is love is love is love, cannot be killed or swept aside.”  
> \- Lin-Manuel Miranda


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